PaceCars@aol.com wrote:
> I don't go for the rolling eligibility date because it leads to the
> same problem the SCCA always had - the Car of the Year. As the newer
> cars become eligible, you have to deal with the fact that the
> regulations, technology and tires have changed. The older cars are
> not competitive anymore, and the money starts getting spent. The
> best rules are the stable ones. If a car was legal in 1972, it still
> is today, and will be in five years. This (in my opinion) leads to
> the cheapest, closest and most historically interesting racing.
This is getting interesting, and more than a little esoteric. If
we're trying to recreate the essence of racing in the "good old
days", is it worth remembering that part of that history was the
development and change that was a constant part of racing? With a
"rolling" cut-off age, at least we now know what next year's car is
going to be!
When I see a note like Tom Shirley's (tshirley@voyageronline.net), to
the effect that "there are getting to be too many organizations and
not enough cars . . ." or the Rosens' (mra@sympatico.ca), saying that
"Here in Canada . . . we have over the past few years lost our entire
pre-war group - and gained a bunch of Minis and Mustangs", I wonder
whether the problem is not the age of the cars but rather proper
classification of cars in race groupings.
Is the goal something other than getting old racing cars on the track
for fun - in groups of comparable speed and size? If you permanently
fix the age of the cars and require a racing pedigree of each car,
you're likely to end up with a very small number of eligible cars -
which you can't modify, you can't build up from a street car, and you
probably can't afford. Hardly a recreation of sports car racing in
the 60's and 70's as I remember it.
Jim Hill
Madison WI
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